Let's Read: The Han Solo Adventures (1979)

[tomandtish]

You may want to reread that. Your take is a bit different than mine.

Spoiler

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Han and Gallandro BOTH have their right hands on the case, so when Han releases the switch both their right arms go numb.

Han then uses his left hand to drag his blaster around until it is on his left hip and the butt is facing forward. Gallandro matches him initially, but when Han throws down the gauntlet he folds.

He's basically challenging Gallandro to an offhand dual drawing a backwards weapon. Gallandro realizes that he can't know whether this is a move Han has practiced for some reason. He wants to try THIS specific duel with micro charges to see what would happen but "You pay to see the cards. You folded". This means we'll never know whether Han could actually win this or ran a massive bluff

.

[The Glyphstone]

Spoiler

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Is the fact that Han explicitly demanded sex with Fiolla as a condition for her release not even worth mentioning? The end-of-book no strings hookup is one thing but she was his hostage at the time.

[pendell]

Spoiler

Show

Han and Gallandro BOTH have their right hands on the case, so when Han releases the switch both their right arms go numb.

Han then uses his left hand to drag his blaster around until it is on his left hip and the butt is facing forward. Gallandro matches him initially, but when Han throws down the gauntlet he folds.

He's basically challenging Gallandro to an offhand dual drawing a backwards weapon. Gallandro realizes that he can't know whether this is a move Han has practiced for some reason. He wants to try THIS specific duel with micro charges to see what would happen but "You pay to see the cards. You folded". This means we'll never know whether Han could actually win this or ran a massive bluff

Spoiler

Show

You're right; both right hands are on the case. It doesn't change the fact that Han changed the conditions from Gallandro's optimal fighting style to one Gallandro wasn't used too, and Gallandro wasn't willing to fight under that disadvantage. It explains why he's still alive.

Spoiler

Show

Is the fact that Han explicitly demanded sex with Fiolla as a condition for her release not even worth mentioning? The end-of-book no strings hookup is one thing but she was his hostage at the time.

Spoiler

Show

Remember that the only reason Han was able to do this at all is because Fiolla set it up; this is a consensual encounter between two adventuring buddies who respect each other on a pretext that won't get Fiolla put in a jail cell herself when all this is wrapped up. There is also absolutely no indication that this isn't consensual. Quite aside from the fact that there's no way a 1970s anti-hero could do this and retain the slightest dram of audience sympathy. Besides, I don't think Han is stupid enough to leave an authority exec who's well on her way to the Senior Board with a grudge against him. He wants her to have happy memories of him so there can be potentially favors in future; if he antagonizes her he'll be dodging bounty hunters for the rest of his life.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[The Glyphstone]

Fair, I guess getting the text second-hand means I'm missing out on the details and nuances that would change the meaning significantly. I just wasn't sure if there was more to it or it was the blue-and-orange morality of 1970's writing at work again.

[runeghost]

Or , again, how he would emulate it on-screen with 1979 computer technology. The personal computer, the Apple IIe, had just come out in 1977. Forget VGA or EGA graphics, even CGA 4-color monitors are about ten years in the future this point. What we're seeing on-screen in ANH are vector graphics for the targeting computer and the gunsights. Those monitor displays probably had to be created on mini- or mainframe computers in the 1970s, and computer hours at the time were not cheap. raster graphics in which we see pictures created by specifying the individual pixels wouldn't be available until ... the mid-80s, I think?

So that would explain why we see computer monitors in fighter cockpits from 1970s SF instead of HUDs ; the ability to portray it in a hollywood movie was simply not available at that period in history, even if the film-makers knew it was available. Which I'm not sure they did. I'm not sure Lucas even knew anything about modern fighter aircraft at the time; pretty much all of Star Wars is based around WWII gun-armed piston fighters in space. As I recall, the Trench Run sequence is a more-or-less direct lift of The Dambusters.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

I've had this odd personal head-canon about Star Wars at least since I was playing the RPG back in the 90s: it's on a completely alien (to us) technology path.

Obviously the real reason is that it's SF, made by human beings who weren't interested in hard-SF topics like "what will UIs look like in the year XXXX?" After all, that's well-established with "Long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away."

But playing along with pretend and having a head-canon is fun. It takes us, here on earth, this long chain of advancement in capabilities, resource access, and ideas to build even what spaceships we're capable of. In the universe of Star Wars, they build starships easier than we built cars a century ago.

So, somehow, they've got this nearly-ubiquitious technology base that produces some things (anti-grav, "blaster"-type weaponry, thrusters that work in vacuum, FTL, AI, robotics) pretty easily, but other things are hard or impossible, both stuff that's common to us: (books, high resolution flatscreen displays) and other stuff that's also SF (teleportation, personal force screens, matter transmission).

Which is fine, because it is a fantastic alien setting. But it's my headcanon that if you were to drill down to where all those hyperdrive and droid components come from, there's something about the underlying process that make getting the parts for what we see easy, and the parts for what we don't see virtually impossible.

[runeghost]

Also, regarding Star Wars' trench run, and The Dam Busters, and WWII films in general...


Here's The Dam Busters with Star War audio.

And, for comparison, Star War with The Dam Buster's audio.

And here they are side-by-side.


But I don't mean to imply Lucas was doing nothing more than an expy of The Dam Busters in space. Like all good creators, he was mixing and matching and building on what had gone before. He also drew a lot from 633 Squadron, a WWII movie about a bomber-squadron doing a run down a narrow fjord to precisely target and destroy a German V2 fuel plant.

Here's Torpedo 633 Squadron set to Star Wars audio.

[The Glyphstone]

I've had this odd personal head-canon about Star Wars at least since I was playing the RPG back in the 90s: it's on a completely alien (to us) technology path.

Obviously the real reason is that it's SF, made by human beings who weren't interested in hard-SF topics like "what will UIs look like in the year XXXX?" After all, that's well-established with "Long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away."

But playing along with pretend and having a head-canon is fun. It takes us, here on earth, this long chain of advancement in capabilities, resource access, and ideas to build even what spaceships we're capable of. In the universe of Star Wars, they build starships easier than we built cars a century ago.

So, somehow, they've got this nearly-ubiquitious technology base that produces some things (anti-grav, "blaster"-type weaponry, thrusters that work in vacuum, FTL, AI, robotics) pretty easily, but other things are hard or impossible, both stuff that's common to us: (books, high resolution flatscreen displays) and other stuff that's also SF (teleportation, personal force screens, matter transmission).

Which is fine, because it is a fantastic alien setting. But it's my headcanon that if you were to drill down to where all those hyperdrive and droid components come from, there's something about the underlying process that make getting the parts for what we see easy, and the parts for what we don't see virtually impossible.

At least in Legends IIRC, basically all technology is derived from the tech base of Ancient Aliens, the Rakatan Empire. People have been copying, reinventing, and iterating on Rakatan technology for thousands and thousands of years without really understanding the principles underlying them. R&D into 'new' never before seen tech is all but non-existent.

[pendell]

Now we're on to the last book: Han Solo and the Lost Legacy!

Chapter 1
In which Han Solo gives notice

Spoiler

Show

The scene opens on the planet Saheelindeel, in the Tion Hegemony , described in text as the back of beyond. Han Solo and company have put the Corporate Sector well behind them , as they are now personally known to a territorial manager, an up-and-coming executive , and just recently escaped from holding the equivalent of a governor hostage with 10,000 credits -- and a hat.

Yes, Chewie had spotten an admiral's hat -- described as "bright braid, snowy white material, glossy black brim and ornate insignia" on the head of an admiral on the Espo destroyer and insisted it be part of the ransom. To my everlasting regret, there are no illustrations of this online so you'll have to do with this as an approximation:



It is high festival on the planet. Han and Chewie are at a fair with the theme "Fertility of the Soil, challenge of the sky." The planet has gone from stone age to space age in under a generation, so many things which are obsolete draw admiring views from the locals.

Han and Chewie's part is to act as pit crew for one of the acts -- a stunt flyer named Grigmin, who is a cheapskate, a deadbeat, insufferingly arrogant, and a middlin-to-fair pilot. He makes a tour of backwoods places in obsolete craft that wouldn't draw a second glance on the more advanced worlds, but here he can have a great crowd of admirers.

Han is not one of them. "Maneuvers any academy greenie can do", is how he dismissively describes Grigmin's act, and the chapter starts with them in a quarrel: Han warns him that he's putting too much strain on his equipment, which was obsolete at the time of the clone war, a generation ago. He could still do a great show if he flew more efficiently, but the excessive acceleration is doing terrible things to the craft.

Grigmin won't have any of it. Han is strongly tempted to swing at him, but one thing Grigmin IS good at is personal, unarmed combat. So he forebears.

The reason Han and Chewie are here is because they are flat out of options. After they skipped out on the Corporate Sector they spent a big chunk of change on ship repair, some more on a few well-deserved wild celebrations, before they had settled down to do some more smuggling. These ventures are high-risk, high-reward, and Han hit a string of bad luck, failing in venture after venture. He was never caught, but his money drained away until at last he and Chewie were so hard up they couldn't even ask for a charter ... they applied for a job, as employees, wage slaves. And Grigmin was the only one who would hire them.

I've known people like this in the states ... employers of last resort. They love to hire people on H1B visas , then work them hard and cheaply in terrible conditions, because the employer knows very well the workers don't have the luxury of quitting; resigning means violation of the visa terms and being kicked out of the country. Grigmin is sharp enough to know a bargain when he sees one, and he's been mercilessly putting the screws to Han and Chewie. The fact he's an insufferable, arrogant jerk doesn't help at all.

Han's next task is to pick up parts for the craft from Fadoop, a local friend of Han's and a fixer. Grigmin suggests he should pick them up himself instead of trusting the local. Han agrees -- provided Grigmin's willing to pay for a starship surface-to-surface hop on the Falcon, since that's the only transportation he has. Grigmin declines. He stalks off, Han gets back to work.

Fadoop arrives. Still no illustration, but she is described as a "short, bandy-legged, densely green-furred primate". She arrives in her craft, the Skybarge, described as a flying collection of parts she has salvaged from one thing or another to create a passable freighter. In game terms, it most definitely has the Junker template applied to it. It's an ugly, like the TYE-wing, a vehicle created by salvaged parts from multiple other craft. Anyone other than Fadoop had best have their last rites all done before stepping into the cockpit.

Han takes off his sweatband (wait! He was wearing a sweatband! AGAIN, no illustration) and greets her. She calls him "Solo-my-friend", her "soul-sealed buddy", which includes Chewbacca. She has golden eyes, and hesitatingly says, "I trust Solo-my-friend, but not Grigmin-the-Blowhard. I hate to bring up money."

For all his faults Han is straight with his friends. He hands it over in exchange for the parts, and all is hunky-dory.

As they conclude their business, Fadoop notes there are two people asking for them at the spaceport; perhaps it's a new job? Han and Chewie exchange one look before piling into the Skybarge with Fadoop to see who it is. Sure, it could be a police trap, but at this time they're almost ready to go to prison rather than stay with Grigmin.

They are a human and humanoid from the University of Rudrig, the only university of note in the entire Tion Hegemony.The university has agreed to supply a local school on Briggia with guidance, materials, and training aids. Hissal, the humanoid, is a representative of that school, described as "tall, reedy, purple skined type ... elongated skull , red eyes."

They have the cargo but, while it is completely legal under both Tion and Imperial law, the Briggian government is as corrupt as a southern sheriff in a Dukes of Hazzard show; there may be trouble. So they are looking for someone who's good at getting cargo to where it's not supposed to be , and Han's name came up. Han is amenable, and after some haggling they settle on a passage price of 1500 credits. Half on consignment, half on delivery.

The deal struck, it's now time to give notice to Grigmin. Han asks to borrow Hadoop's Skybarge. She agrees, but warns him that there's a full cargo of fertilizer aboard. That won't be a problem; Han can make use of it.

So he takes off in the Skybarge and heads to the airshow just as Grigmin is concluding his own show. Demonstrating his utter contempt for Grigmin's flying ability, he proceeds to complete Grigmin's entire routine, maneuver for maneuver, in Hadoop's ancient crate.

The routine includes a pair loops. But going into the first loop, Han shuts down his port side engine.

The locals below gasp in shock and horror, pointing. Grigmin, who expected to be the center of attention, is furious at being upstaged, but no one is paying him any mind; they're too absorbed by the apparent near-crash that is happening in front of them.

Han goes through the second loop, then shuts down the other engine and goes into a third loop at zero thrust!

Shock! Horror! Wonder!

Han makes it through the third loop and begins to coast to the airstrip, to the mad cheers and screams of the crowd -- but when he gets to the airstrip, only one wheel comes out.

Grigmin grins at this , but the grin is soon wiped off his face and the vehicle bounces back up. Then the second bay opens and the second wheel extends. One more bounce, the tail wheel appears, and at last the Skybarge settles down to a perfect three-point landing.

As the crowd cheers itself hoarse, Grigmin has just enough time to realize the Skybarge is heading right toward him! He just has time to dodge out of the way. Han throws him a wicked grin from the cockpit. The Skybarge is high enough off the bround that it is able to pass right over Grigmin's fighter! As it does, Han throws the CARGO JETTISON switch and fills Grigmin's cockpit with the fertilizer cargo.

Han takes home the first prize trophy for the fair. Grigmin takes home a pile of s- a pile of fertilizer. And he can fix his own blasted spacecraft, thank you very much.

Now that's how you quit a job!

I gotta admit, this was a fun chapter to review. It feels like we're getting back into the swing of things. I was having a hard time in the last few chapters of the last book -- maybe because I remembered the ending and didn't like it? Maybe because it seemed too abrupt? Maybe because Han and Chewie seemed to be more ping-pong balls being batted around than functioning characters? Whatever. The books are back , and I'm enjoying them now!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[runeghost]

Now we're on to the last book: Han Solo at Star's End!

Chapter 1
In which Han Solo gives notice

Spoiler

Show

The scene opens on the planet Saheelindeel, in the Tion Hegemony , described in text as the back of beyond. Han Solo and company have put the Corporate Sector well behind them , as they are now personally known to a territorial manager, an up-and-coming executive , and just recently escaped from holding the equivalent of a governor hostage with 10,000 credits -- and a hat.

Yes, Chewie had spotten an admiral's hat -- described as "bright braid, snowy white material, glossy black brim and ornate insignia" on the head of an admiral on the Espo destroyer and insisted it be part of the ransom. To my everlasting regret, there are no illustrations of this online so you'll have to do with this as an approximation:



It is high festival on the planet. Han and Chewie are at a fair with the theme "Fertility of the Soil, challenge of the sky." The planet has gone from stone age to space age in under a generation, so many things which are obsolete draw admiring views from the locals.

Han and Chewie's part is to act as pit crew for one of the acts -- a stunt flyer named Grigmin, who is a cheapskate, a deadbeat, insufferingly arrogant, and a middlin-to-fair pilot. He makes a tour of backwoods places in obsolete craft that wouldn't draw a second glance on the more advanced worlds, but here he can have a great crowd of admirers.

Han is not one of them. "Maneuvers any academy greenie can do", is how he dismissively describes Grigmin's act, and the chapter starts with them in a quarrel: Han warns him that he's putting too much strain on his equipment, which was obsolete at the time of the clone war, a generation ago. He could still do a great show if he flew more efficiently, but the excessive acceleration is doing terrible things to the craft.

Grigmin won't have any of it. Han is strongly tempted to swing at him, but one thing Grigmin IS good at is personal, unarmed combat. So he forebears.

The reason Han and Chewie are here is because they are flat out of options. After they skipped out on the Corporate Sector they spent a big chunk of change on ship repair, some more on a few well-deserved wild celebrations, before they had settled down to do some more smuggling. These ventures are high-risk, high-reward, and Han hit a string of bad luck, failing in venture after venture. He was never caught, but his money drained away until at last he and Chewie were so hard up they couldn't even ask for a charter ... they applied for a job, as employees, wage slaves. And Grigmin was the only one who would hire them.

I've known people like this in the states ... employers of last resort. They love to hire people on H1B visas , then work them hard and cheaply in terrible conditions, because the employer knows very well the workers don't have the luxury of quitting; resigning means violation of the visa terms and being kicked out of the country. Grigmin is sharp enough to know a bargain when he sees one, and he's been mercilessly putting the screws to Han and Chewie. The fact he's an insufferable, arrogant jerk doesn't help at all.

Han's next task is to pick up parts for the craft from Fadoop, a local friend of Han's and a fixer. Grigmin suggests he should pick them up himself instead of trusting the local. Han agrees -- provided Grigmin's willing to pay for a starship surface-to-surface hop on the Falcon, since that's the only transportation he has. Grigmin declines. He stalks off, Han gets back to work.

Fadoop arrives. Still no illustration, but she is described as a "short, bandy-legged, densely green-furred primate". She arrives in her craft, the Skybarge, described as a flying collection of parts she has salvaged from one thing or another to create a passable freighter. In game terms, it most definitely has the Junker template applied to it. It's an ugly, like the TYE-wing, a vehicle created by salvaged parts from multiple other craft. Anyone other than Fadoop had best have their last rites all done before stepping into the cockpit.

Han takes off his sweatband (wait! He was wearing a sweatband! AGAIN, no illustration) and greets her. She calls him "Solo-my-friend", her "soul-sealed buddy", which includes Chewbacca. She has golden eyes, and hesitatingly says, "I trust Solo-my-friend, but not Grigmin-the-Blowhard. I hate to bring up money."

For all his faults Han is straight with his friends. He hands it over in exchange for the parts, and all is hunky-dory.

As they conclude their business, Fadoop notes there are two people asking for them at the spaceport; perhaps it's a new job? Han and Chewie exchange one look before piling into the Skybarge with Fadoop to see who it is. Sure, it could be a police trap, but at this time they're almost ready to go to prison rather than stay with Grigmin.

They are a human and humanoid from the University of Rudrig, the only university of note in the entire Tion Hegemony.The university has agreed to supply a local school on Briggia with guidance, materials, and training aids. Hissal, the humanoid, is a representative of that school, described as "tall, reedy, purple skined type ... elongated skull , red eyes."

They have the cargo but, while it is completely legal under both Tion and Imperial law, the Briggian government is as corrupt as a southern sheriff in a Dukes of Hazzard show; there may be trouble. So they are looking for someone who's good at getting cargo to where it's not supposed to be , and Han's name came up. Han is amenable, and after some haggling they settle on a passage price of 1500 credits. Half on consignment, half on delivery.

The deal struck, it's now time to give notice to Grigmin. Han asks to borrow Hadoop's Skybarge. She agrees, but warns him that there's a full cargo of fertilizer aboard. That won't be a problem; Han can make use of it.

So he takes off in the Skybarge and heads to the airshow just as Grigmin is concluding his own show. Demonstrating his utter contempt for Grigmin's flying ability, he proceeds to complete Grigmin's entire routine, maneuver for maneuver, in Hadoop's ancient crate.

The routine includes a pair loops. But going into the first loop, Han shuts down his port side engine.

The locals below gasp in shock and horror, pointing. Grigmin, who expected to be the center of attention, is furious at being upstaged, but no one is paying him any mind; they're too absorbed by the apparent near-crash that is happening in front of them.

Han goes through the second loop, then shuts down the other engine and goes into a third loop at zero thrust!

Shock! Horror! Wonder!

Han makes it through the third loop and begins to coast to the airstrip, to the mad cheers and screams of the crowd -- but when he gets to the airstrip, only one wheel comes out.

Grigmin grins at this , but the grin is soon wiped off his face and the vehicle bounces back up. Then the second bay opens and the second wheel extends. One more bounce, the tail wheel appears, and at last the Skybarge settles down to a perfect three-point landing.

As the crowd cheers itself hoarse, Grigmin has just enough time to realize the Skybarge is heading right toward him! He just has time to dodge out of the way. Han throws him a wicked grin from the cockpit. The Skybarge is high enough off the bround that it is able to pass right over Grigmin's fighter! As it does, Han throws the CARGO JETTISON switch and fills Grigmin's cockpit with the fertilizer cargo.

Han takes home the first prize trophy for the fair. Grigmin takes home a pile of s- a pile of fertilizer. And he can fix his own blasted spacecraft, thank you very much.

Now that's how you quit a job!

I gotta admit, this was a fun chapter to review. It feels like we're getting back into the swing of things. I was having a hard time in the last few chapters of the last book -- maybe because I remembered the ending and didn't like it? Maybe because it seemed too abrupt? Maybe because Han and Chewie seemed to be more ping-pong balls being batted around than functioning characters? Whatever. The books are back , and I'm enjoying them now!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

That brings back memories. And it's note-perfect Solo (at least to me), start to finish.

To fall into what's become a bit of a habit of mine, your re-read (which I'm really enjoying, tyvm for sharing it!) just makes me shake my head at what a complete missed opportunity the Solo movie was. All three of these books are a bit short by modern standards, and could easily have been adapted into a quite good film trilogy (without the seemingly compulsive need to dump all of Han's backstory into a single film) without having to make any painful cuts. And now we'll likely never get those films nor anything like them. We still have the books, so all that's been lost is opportunity, but such squandering of IP, money, and time is something I see increasingly happening, particularly with SF and fantasy.

To get back on topic, I remember the ending, and now that you've recapped it, the start, but I have no memory of how we get from the one to the other. I'm looking forward to finding out!

(Do you plan on doing the Lando trilogy afterwards? My memories of it are even fuzzier - likely because I didn't have on-hand copies - but I seem to recall thinking it was at least as good as this Han Solo Trilogy.)

[pendell]

(Do you plan on doing the Lando trilogy afterwards? My memories of it are even fuzzier - likely because I didn't have on-hand copies - but I seem to recall thinking it was at least as good as this Han Solo Trilogy.)

I think not. This is already going to be a half-year project by the time I'm done with just these three books; if they ARE that good I hope someone else will pick them up; I confess I've never read them.

Chapter 2
The Power of a 3D printer

Spoiler

Show

The chapter opens on the planet Briggia, in their spaceport, where Han is unloading his legal cargo to throngs of university students who are busy loading it up and carrying it away. The only thing left is the 'duplicator', "it will print and collate material at a speed our presses cannot match and synthesize any paper or
other material from the raw constituents it contains."

Paper money and printing presses. How quaint old SF's view of the future is .

Hissal, their contact, tries to tip Han but the money he hands over is currency from the Briggian New Regime, which is only good on Briggia and worthless anywhere else; typical trick for a small third-world (third-galaxy?) country , which is to hoard all the available hard currency themselves, gaining a chokehold on all trade, while forcing the local population to make due with their own fiat money.

Hissal points to some of the "profits" of this lock on trade -- the New Regime had spent the money on a consulting firm, which gave them this currency and sold them a whopping helping of military hardware. Among other things , they bought a Marauder-class corvette, which promptly blew critical components on its shakedown cruise and of course there are no skilled technicians on Briggia able to repair it. So there it sits on the tarmac, who knows how many credits just rusting away in Briggia's sun.

I'm given to understand this is also a thing that happened during the cold war, small third world countries investing in things like Jet fighters when they had no enemies with any air force worth mentioning, all as a way of showing their own power. Hissal is contemptuous; they are a poor planet. Surely the New Regime should have other priorities? As it is, the university can't afford to purchase texts or materials so everything they had or are getting is coming through donation. Han being Han, he is simply cynical about the entire affair.

It is at this point the Briggian authorities show up to arrest the university students. I believe the French term for troops like these is "opera bouffe"; they are carrying antique secondhand weapons and uniforms originally sized for humans that look comically ridiculous on them. Badly-fitting battle harness, far-too-loose helmets, filigreed shoulder boards, embroidered dispatch cases, and spats on the feet because the Briggian anatomy won't fit human combat boots. Nonetheless, they quickly surround the students and start dragging them into the equivalent of hurry-up wagons.

Han further notes that the troop transports the police have arrived in are old garbage trucks.

A voice through a loudhailer offers friendship and asks Han to surrender Hissal, who is still on board. Han asks about his money, and a counteroffer for parley is made. Han agrees, with the understanding that they will pull back and turn off the floodlights. This is done, and a single person steps up to the Falcon, carrying what looks like an official-looking scroll; perhaps a proclamation of some kind?

Han asks Hissal to have a seat in the forward compartment and promises not to hand him over to the police.

The Briggian -- Inspector Keek, chief of Internal Security police, boards. Taller than Hissal, broadly built for his species, somewhat darker in coloration. Chrome-studded battle-harness, rhinestone shoulder boards. several colorful aiguillettes, a salad of decorations and impressive, red-sequinned spats. A helmet with a plume complete this assemblage of bad taste. Han notices the medals, including one proclaiming its wearer the spelling champion of Oor VII; either Keek is well- travelled or the medals, also, are secondhand trash.

Han invites him aboard and into the forward compartment with Hissal where they can discuss business. Han reminds Keek that his shipment is legitimate and the Briggians hve no business interfering with it, for which he has all the necessary clearances. Keek demurrs; this scroll he is carrying is an interdict, placing teaching materials and the duplicator on the restricted list; they cannot be imported. Han scoffs at this; these are Imperial regulations and rules, which aren't changeable by someplae like Briggia. Han ask for his payment. Keek, to no one's surprise, offers him payment in New Regime currency, which of course Han can't take.

Han suggests he does come through with it, or he will drop Hissal off elsewhere in the planet with the duplicator, with which .. well, let's see. He takes the new currency he was given as a "tip" and runs it through the duplicator. Within seconds he has a bright, shiny copy of it. The duplicator can also be programmed to add new serial numbers and similar tricks; apparently the consulting firm which sold the currency to the Briggians was a cut-rate outfit; the currency is not secure even against a commercial duplicator.

Faced with this threat, Keek has had enough. He turns his scroll to show it is, in fact, a concealed gun, and demands Han turn over Kissal and everything else right now if he wants to keep breathing. Moving carefully, Han triggers the Dejarik gameboard. Seeing the apparent spectacle of monsters appearing from nowhere, Keek turns and fires on the gameboard, and this gives Han the distraction he needs to jump him. Keek puts up quite a fight, but Hissal joins in and between the two of them they are able to subdue the inspector.

Han demands the students and cargo back aboard in five minutes in exchange for Keek's life. Keek agrees, but grumbles that this will be an Imperial death sentence for Han. Han isn't worried; not only is he using a false ID, but the Empire is pretty distracted at the moment so it's unlikely this will show up on their radar at all.

Once they're aboard and Keek is released, the Millenium Falcon -- in a twist of fate , the most powerful warship in the Briggia system at the moment -- goes on an orbit where Hissal can use his new broadcasting rig, which should be able to reach every transceiver on the planet, before Han sets him, the students and the cargo down again.

Bollux is worried about the implications of destabilizing a planetary government, to which Han responds: "Serves them right for cheating! "

Well, that was a hilarious caper but , unfortunately, I don't think it ended well for the Briggians. As recounted in Xwing classic mission 1-3 and 1-4, the Rebels built a hidden base on Briggia, which the Empire subsequently stomped flat. No indication as to what happened to the local people caught up in it, though the planet doesn't seem to have been Base Delta Zeroed. I suppose even the New Regime will seem like a benevolent peaceable kingdom compared to living under direct Imperial occupation.

Still, Han and Chewie seem to have got away and they once again have a positive bank balance ; warm-up is over, now it's time for the story proper!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[pendell]

So here we are in Chapter 3. Looks like a short one this time.

Captain Chewbacca and the furries

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We start up on the planet Rudrig in the Tion Hegemony. This is the location of the university which donated both the materials and equipment to the Briggian satellite school in the last chapter, and here Han has gone to be paid off. His friend Chewbacca is getting proper grooming in their hotel, which caters to many species including Wookies. Han, for his part, is just leaving the university where he's been paid off when he hears a voice call out: "Hey there, Slick!"

Now that's a nickname Han hasn't heard in a very long time. Weapons are illegal on Rudrig, but that hasn't stopped Han from carrying his blaster in a concealed holster, he turns, preparing to draw, before he recognizes the speaker, and converts it into an extended hand for shaking, calling out a friendly "Trooper!" using the other person's nickname in turn.

For "Trooper" is who this is, real name Aleksandr Badure , no image available. "A big man with a head full of hair going white, a sly squint, and a belly that had come to overlap his belt in recent years ... seemed to have come on hard times. Faded, patched laborer's tunic and trousers, scuffed and torn work boots. Still , Badure had held on to his old flight jacket , covered with its unit insignia and theater patches, and his jaunty, sweat-stained beret with its fighter-wing flash."

So Badure, like Han, is a former fighter pilot and they were in the same unit. We also learn that Badure had gone into smuggling same as Han did, and he is the one who saved their lives on a previous Kessel run. Han owes him his life for that, and so does Chewie.

With him is a female by the name of Hasti (again, no image). "Short and slender, not long into womanhood, with a pale face and disorderly red hair that hung limply. Her brows and lashes were so light they scarcely showed. She wore a drab, baggy outfit of pullover and pants, and her shoes appear to be a size too large. Her hands had seen hard work. Han had met many men and women just like her, each bearing the stamp of the mining camp drone or factory worker."

She looks at Han like she might look at a piece of gum stuck to her shoe. Badure makes his pitch: He and Hasti are in a jam and they need a pilot with skills. They knew how to find Han because they're the ones who gave the university Han's name when THEY were looking for a pilot, so Han owes his life out from under Grigmin's thumb to Badure as well.

Even so, Han has known Badure awhile and isn't about to risk his life again, not after what happened the last time. Telling Badure that saving a man's life doesn't give him the right to risk it again, Han tells him no. Badure asks if Chewie will see it that way, but Han insists Chewbacca will see it his way -- "if I have to reason with him with a wrench", he says in an aside to himself. When Badure says he's not asking Han to do it for free, Han retorts by offering to spot him some cash to help him out.

In this culture and this time, this is a mortal insult. Badure may be poor , and he may have won and lost countless fortunes, but he's far too proud to take charity. Hasti , meanwhile, has been pulling at Badure to go practically since the interview started, so at last Badure sincerely wishes Han clear skies and they part.

Han head to the hotel and gets cleaned up. As he goes to meet Chewbacca he is stopped by two young college-age women who ask if he is there for Captain Chewbacca.

CaptainChewbacca?

Yes, Captain Chewbacca. Seems the ladies, who are ethnology students at the university, saw Chewie's fine admiral's hat and concluded he was the captain of the Millenium Falcon. They don't often get a chance to meet a wookie, let alone one who captains a starship, so they stopped to speak to him and learn what they could. Chewie has done nothing to dissuade them of his "captaincy" and has, in fact, invited the two ladies out for a drive. Han introduces himself as "First Mate Han Solo" and they wait for Chewbacca together. When he emerges from his grooming session, Han goes into the obsequious-crewer mode he learned as a civilian sailor, not so long ago, and hams it up extravagantly. Chewbacca takes the three of them to the ride he has rented ...

Oh my stars.

"Eight meters long, wide and low to the ground, the ground coach's sides, rear deck, and hood were outfitted with dazzling greel wood that had been lacquered and polished ... until its metallic gleam seemed to go forever throug the fine grain. The coach's trim, bumpers, door hinges, latches, and handles are of silver alloy. It boasted an outlandish crystal hood ornament -- frolicking nymphs in a swirl of gauzy, windblown veil dresses. ... From the coach's primary and secondary antenna fluttered two pennants, several streamers, and the furry tail of some small, luckless animal". I'm cutting this short, but there's at least another two or three sentences in there.

"Too austere" , Han comments as Chewbacca opens the cargo hatch to reveal a glorious picnic lunch, just the thing for a party of four to enjoy a day together.

And perhaps ... more?
Han seems to have that in mind as he suggested that if the ladies know any off-color duties they should sing them. "He likes those?" one asks. "No, I do." Says Han, who if he's bisexual has a definite strong attraction to the hetero side of the world.

Come to think of it, we've never really noticed how Chewbacca meets his needs, such as they are. But then , this is a big galaxy and I suppose there's someone for everyone. Jabba likes Twi'lek girls, and that would seem to be a biological impossibility. I guess in the GFFA 'love is love', and what would send a conservative person into a seizure on earth doesn't even raise an eyebrow in the GFFA, since at least the partner you're bringing home on Earth still has roughly the same arms, legs, and body temperature as yourself. It's probably fair to assume that humans have enjoyed intimate relations with every compatible species in the GFFA and some that aren't. Certainly Chewbacca doesn't seem to mind that his prospective partners are a different species entirely from himself.

At any rate, while these preparations are occurring Han brings up to Chewie his encounter with Badure, and Chewbacca insists on going to help him -- Chewbacca is a wookie, and a Life Debt is a Life Debt.

"What if I don't want to? Are you going after him without me?" Han at last asks.

Chewie responds "Urrr?" which in context obviously means "Am I going to have to?"

Han admits defeat. "No, you won't have to. Get in the bus." So that's that. In a sense Chewbacca IS the captain today, because he's getting what he wants and Han isn't. Han wonders why he bothered to tell him ... but my guess is because , deep down, he knew helping Badure was the right thing to do, knew Chewbacca would talk him into it, but for some reason he couldn't admit this to himself. Maybe because it would shatter his self-image of a cold-hearted mercenary who only acts on what's good for him? Even though the rest of us know that's absolutely not what he is at all?

So they all pile into the engine and fire it up. One of the young ladies -- named Viurre and Kiili, it seems -- asks Han how things are different on a Wookie world. "The tables are higher off the floor", Han responds.

And with our heroes off to their romantic assignation, I guess we should conclude the plot hook has been swallowed and we'll be in pursuit of Badure and Hasti to see what reckless adventure they'll take us on. A slow chapter but a short one. Also there seems to be a lot more comedy elements in this story than in the last two ... that monster of a limo Chewie has rented has slapstick written all over it. For some reason I think of the Deathmobile from animal house.

The Rudrig system also shows up in X-wing as a target of the Empire after they destroy the base at Briggia, but they are thwarted by clever alliance tactics which culminates in the destruction of the operation's flagship, the ISD-II Invincible. It's also mentioned in hand ful of other works. See the mentions section .

And that's it for now! Next time we ride a deathmobile!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[pendell]

I have a suspicion I'm going to be very busy tomorrow so I'm going to crank this out now.

Chapter 4
Get in loser, we're going for a ride

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Han, Chewie, Viurre and Kiili -- the two young coeds who have found Chewbacca interesting --
travel in their coach to Badure's last known vacation. He isn't hard to find. Nor is it hard
to explain their change of heart, not when Chewbacca's kindness is so well known.

The two ladies step out of earshot while Han and Chewie discuss with Badure and Hasti. Badure fills Han in on his new plan: He's on the trail of the legendary Queen of Ranroon


Centuries ago the Tion cluster was the stomping grounds of a would-be conquerer named Xim the Despot. He loaded much of his tribute aboard the Queen, the largest vessel built in her day, for transport to specially prepared treasure vaults on the planet Dellalt.

Except the ship never arrived, and Xim was defeated at the Third Battle of Vontorr. The
empty vaults are still there on Dellalt, a minor tourist attraction in a busy galaxy.

Fortune hunters have been chasing the legend of the Queen of Ranroon for centuries, and now Badure has a line to where the log-recorder disk of that legendary vessel is. Han scoffs ..

... but his suspicions are allayed somewhat when a black limo pulls up and six armed beings come pouring out. Clearly Badure must be on to something.

One of the beings is wielding a blaster set on stun, with which he tags Badure. Han returns a hasty shot, which catches the stun-wielder in the arm. A nasty firefight is beginning to shape up when Hasti grabs Badure, throws him into the rental vehicle, gets in and slams it into reverse. A pair of goons leaping at the vehicle suddenly find themselves leaping into air and hit the ground sprawling. Han and Chewie jump aside as the vehicle tears between them. Hasti hollers to the group: "Get in!"



I forgot to mention in the last chapter that this rental is a ground effect vehicle which, among everything else, has running boards and external bars for footmen to ride on the exterior. Han graps for one and hangs on with one hand while keeping up suppressive fire with the other. Hasti steps on the accelerator, and they're away!

They don't quite clear the black vehicle in front of them, but Hasti bashes it aside with a loud crunch as some of the greel wood exterior comes off in the collision. But she's not stopping for anything. Away we go!

There's a delivery truck in the way. Hasti does a radical swerve to avoid it and succeeds, but it flips Chewie over, tisting his neck and sending his hat flying. Farewell, Admiral's hat. You were a great piece of extra story that I wish we'd had for longer.

The bad guys have piled in their own car and in pursuit. Ahead, there's a tow truck in the intersection. Hasti doesn't care. She leans on the horn -- which, incidentally, plays the first two bars of the Rudrig university anthem -- and blasts right through the intersection, ignoring the traffic signal. The towing vehicle with its cargo just barely manages to avoid collision.

Next obstacle is a line of students ambling their way through a crosswalk on an orientation tour. Hasti slams on the brakes, throwing Chewbacca forward and over the seat. Even so, Chewbacca notices, bruised neck and all, that Badure isn't fully in and tugs him the rest of the way into the vehicle. Hasti helps by slamming the vehicle in the opposite direction, causing the door on that side to fly shut.

Han smashes out the rear window for a clear shot and sights on their pursuers, but the vehicle is bouncing around too much, so he waits for a clear shot.

Chewie succeeds in getting into the front and takes over the driving from Hasti, who is more than willing to let a veteran star pilot take the controls. Chewie makes a sharp turn and finds himself charging into road construction; the way is impassable. Unphased, Chewbacca executes a
Bootleg turn, flipping the vehicle end-for-end to accomplish a 180 in little more space than the width of the vehicle itself, and charges their pursuer head-on! Time for a Chicken Run!

Thing about a chicken run is ... someone's got to have enough sense of self-preservation to break off or everyone goes to the junkyard in the sky together.

But Han and Chewie are crazy. They will NOT break off.

The driver of the black limo realizes this and squeals out of the way. Han has a brief glimpse of their terrified faces as Chewbacca blasts pass them, then makes a hard right turn and finds themselves going up a freeway onramp.

There's a garbage truck ambling along, but Chewie doesn't let that stop him. He jerks hard to the right and puts his vehicle at a 45 degree angle against the guardrail there, goes right up past the truck in about half the space the vehicle is supposed to take , blasts through the divider, and now finds himself zipping along the wrong way into three lanes of opposing traffic, merrily blaring away with the horn all the way.

We look back and the black limo is STILL on their tail. Dunno who these people are, but they are both skilled and crazy. Is all that money really worth this kind of risk?


Chewie makes a ninety degree turn but the other vehicle manages to fishtail its way across three lanes of traffic and is still in hot pursuit. Just who ARE these people? Are they Jedi?

The limo is catching up with them, as they are able to take advantage of the lane Chewie is cutting through the traffic. Han fires on them but succeeds in nothing but blowing a chunk out of the pavement.

Chewie rams the center divider, taking off the decorative lanterns, scattering what's left of the picnic lunch, leaving the curb fenders, but when it's over they're turned around and heading down the opposite side of the freeway, this time going in the right direction. Meanwhile, the other vehicles on the road are noticing the shenanigans; those on auto pilot are pulling over to the side of the road and parking to avoid damage. All the sensible getting out of the way of these crazies as their race goes on.

And the Limo STILL keeps up! A man , wielding a blaster rifle, gets on the roof of the vehicle and shoots carefully. They hit the coach repeatedly, and if this keeps up we're going to be killed. These guys are good.

Chewie cuts in front of a truck to avoid fire, which is just as well, as the truck is hit by a blaster shot. Seized by inspiration, Han tells Chewie to hit the brakes! He does, somehow the truck avoids them, and when all is done, they are even with the limo. Han fires on the sniper and tags him in the arm. Several others start to come out as the sniper sinks back into the vehicle, cradling his wound, and this time they've got a rocket launcher!

That ain't good.

Chewbacca accelerates and heads right up to the freight hauler, which is a flat bed about half full of some kind of ore, forming what could almost be an impromptu ramp..

impromptu ramp?

No. No no NO. Tell me you're not thinking what you're thinking.

But he is. There's an overpass coming up and Chewbacca guns the engine, surging right up into the cargo bed, up the cargo, then soars majestically into the air, landing on the overpass!

Good stars in heaven.

This is one move the pursuers can't emulate, and they are soon forced away by the flow of traffic on the highway, while our heroes coach , with a wrecked shock absorption system, stripped of the last of the lanterns and decorative wood, and in all other respects a total wreck, isn't going anywhere. Chewie hangs back for a minute with a mournful expression as everyone else prepares to make tracks before the local law shows up; even Badure, who had recovered from his stunning a few minutes ago, no doubt helped by stark terror and adrenaline.

He'll have a hard time getting his deposit back, Han notes.

Well. Well. That was quite a ride. I think we hit every car-chase trope in the 1970s lexicon and it was a fun read besides. If they ever do decide to make a movie out of this they have to include that chapter. Still, I suspect there goes much of their remaining money after this little escapade.

Anyways, we have our plot hook, and we've survived our initial brush with the opposition, so now onto the adventure proper in the next episode!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Dargaron]

So, since the discussion seems to have died down, I just wanted to post to say that I'm eagerly following what's going on, even if it's from lurk mode most of the time.

Also, even though basically none of the previous two books rang any bells, some of the names are starting to bring back memories from the old Star Wars Essential Guide to [X]'s that I used to read as a kid. If what's coming up is what I think it is, it's one of those cool little nuggets of Star Wars that makes the galaxy actually feel old.

[Velaryon]

I'm also enjoying the ride. This is the book I remember best from this trilogy, and while I don't remember everything it's definitely coming back to me.

[tomandtish]

Agreed. Still enjoying it. Regarding the chase...

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I don't think they would have to be Jedi (I know that was humor) to do this. The car in back has to react to the first car's movements, but has the advantage of seeing what they did and (if they aren't too close) having the ability to react to it. It's why high speed chases are much more likely to end with the suspect crashing rather than police.

[pendell]

Thank you, TomandTish, dargaron, Velaryon. The encouragment is very helpful; each installment takes about two hours. While I have enough of a sense of professionalism to push through even without feedback, it DOES make it all the easier.

As far as the chase goes, I thought the fact police usually "win" had more to do with the fact they have helicopters, additional vehicles, roadblocks, and a host of gadgets allowing them to disable a fleeing vehicle.

Be that as it may, high speed chases are increasingly discouraged due to the risk to offender, bystanders, and the pursuing officers. So it is technically possible to get away from the police, at least temporarily. Of course, they'll probably have your license plate number and will be waiting for you at home, so it's not as if this is Hazzard County from the 70s show.

Next chapter.

Chapter 5
Exposition and new characters. An old enemy.

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The chapter starts with Han un-cricking Chewbacca's neck, which still hurts after that last little race. After Chewbacca is settled, they sit down at the Dejarik gameboard and Badure starts on the exposition.

He met Hasti and her sister, Lanni, when he was working as contract labor at a mining plunder camp.

"Plunder camp" -- a very, very short term mining operation which is barely legal. Get financing from a crime boss, acquire a mining license by hook or by crook, typically by bribing a ministry official, set up shop, grab as much as you can in a month or three, then split before inspectors or legal authorities can check on what you're doing. Then do it again somewhere else. Of course, this short-term means they don't worry about details like safety regulation or environmental laws or mandatory maximum work hours or anything like that ; it's one step up from a pirate camp, operating with the barest veneer of legality. This group is run by twins: the woman J'uoch and her brother R'all. They, together, with their enforcer, Egome Fass, 'a Houk taller even then Chewie', came up the hard way and they are extremely ruthless.

All of these camps are hell on earth, and this is one of the worst. Lanni, Hasti, and Badure look out for each other there. Lanni is a pilot who does a lot of surface-to-surface hops; while on one of these expeditions, on the planet Dellalt, she came across a log-recorder disk. Disks are something that haven't been used in centuries for log-recording. She couldn't read much of it, but she recognized one of the characters as indicating the Queen of Ranroon. The mining operators run surprise inspections and she didn't want it found, so she diverted and dropped it off in a safe-deposit box at the actual vaults of Dellalt, still waiting all these centuries for the treasure. Whatever the fate of the Queen herself, the log recorder disk arrived.

Then the mine operators were tipped off, and they killed Lanni trying to get the disk from her.

So we have one more party member joining us , then it's off to Dellalt before the rental agent comes looking for his groundcoach.

The newest party member is Skynx, of whom we at least have a statue:



Skynx is faculty at the university of Rudrig, an expert on pre-republic languages. A Rurrian, "of average size, a meter long, low to the ground, natural coat a thick, woolly amber with bands of brown and red. Moved on eight pairs of limbs with a graceful, rippling motion. Feathery bobbing antenna ... big , multifaceted red eyes, a tiny mouth, and small nostrils."

He is in the larval stage of his species life cycle; the adult stage is non-sapient. So before he takes wings and becomes a chroma-wing who cares for nothing but mating and eating, he wants to have one crazy adventure. Well, he's certainly come to the right place for that!

Badure will pay Han double his first-asking price if he just flies them to Dellalt and back. However, if Han throws in they'll get a full share for the both of them.

Hasti speaks up and demands half-share for the two, while Han at the same time demands full share each. Badure breaks it down this way: Full share for him because he got Hasti off Dellalt alive and knows as much as she does. Two shares for Hasti -- one for her, one for the deceased Lanni. Half-shares for the others subject to further negotiation depending on how things go on the trip. Given we're talking about wealth beyond the wildest dreams of avarice, even a half share should be wealth uncounted.

Han eventually agrees. Skynx joins them, trailed by a baggage carrier with a lot of stuff. After the other are about their business, Badure takes Han aside and warns him that word is someone's looking for Han -- someone's spreading money around and is probably after him.

Han has a pretty good guess who this is -- remember Gallandro? The top-rate gunman whom we flimflammed and forced to act as a hostage negotiator? The person we forced to back down publicly in a duel, even if that was part of his job? Gallandro hasn't forgotten and, so far as he's concerned, the score needs settling.

Badure whistles and gives us some backstory: "Gallandro? Slick, you're talking about the guy who single-handedly hijacked the Quamar Messenger on her maiden run and took over that pirate's nest, Geedon V, all by himself. And he went to the gun against the Mallorm family, drawing head bounty on all five of them. And no one has ever beaten the score he rolled up when he was flying a fighter with Marso's Demons. Besides which, he's the only man who has ever forced the Assassin's Guild to default on a contract ; he personally cancelled half of their Elite Circle, one at a time, plus various journeymen and apprentices ... his kind live on of their reputations. ... They accept no insult and they never, ever back down. He'll make you his career until he settles with you."

Reaallly.

The flight to Dellalt begins. Han spends a lot of time practicing his fast draw against the ship's remote, seen in A New Hope used for lightsaber practice. Turns out its original purpose was as a foil for a blaster-armed opponent. Blue Max controls the remote, and Han beats it every time, but he's still not satisfied. When he last encountered Gallandro he couldn't even follow his practice draw. But there's nothing more to be gained from the remote unless it is set to zero reaction time and of course there's no way any human can beat that.

During a break, Skynx opens up his cargo and shows them some of his artifacts. One of them is an automaton head; "Optical lenses darkened by long radiation exposure, armored like a dreadnaught with a course, grey alloy" It still has readable military insignia and markings. This is all that is left of a war-robot of Xim the Despot, his absolutely faithful bodyguard. These may be the remnants of the only one not vaporized in the Third Battle of Vontor, his final battle. There are more parts in the other boxes.One of them contains the chest plate, which has Xim's personal insignia, a skull with twin starbursts in the eyes, emblazoned on the front. It's the image from the cover.


There were at least a thousand of these stationed on the Queen of Ranroon to protect the treasure onboard. Perhaps we will have the opportunity to encounter them, or salvage more artifacts?

We approach the end of the trip. Hanni enters the compartment dressed as Lanni; she has the rental code and other documents , so she will impersonate her sister at the vaults and withdraw from the safety deposit box. Of course she is Lanni's heir so this subterfuge shouldn't be necessary, but perhaps this will prevent any unneeded questions?

Everyone goes to their stations for arrival, leaving Bollux behind to inspect, carefully, the head of the war-robot.

...

Getting ideas, Bollux?

So this chapter set up the pieces which should see us through the rest of the story; hopefully there won't be any need for more exposition for the duration of the story. Skynx's species also shows up in Roger Allen Macbride's Rogue Powers , in which the concept was explored thoroughly and resulted in a philosophy and worldview very different from humans, who remain sapient as a rule for our entire lives. I suppose we should expect some cross-pollination, since Allen also wrote a number of Star Wars Legends novels as well.

So ... next time, we arrive at Dellalt, ready for treasure beyond our wildest dreams! What'll we do with the money?

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Velaryon]

I didn't realize Ruurians appeared in any other novels. I always thought it was cool to see caterpillar people, since that's not one of the more common "animal, but humanoid" species ideas. Contrast that with the more feline-ish species, of which I can think of at least three in Star Wars without even trying. As far as I knew, this was the only appearance of a Ruurian. That's good to know, thanks for sharing!

[Noldo]

I have really liked these readings, but don’t have much to comment as I have no prior exposure to the stories.

But following these makes the decisions made with Solo movie that much more difficult to understand. Isn’t the very reason to use Solo that the audience is familiar with him, knows the character? Why on earth you choose to waste movie explaining his origins (and doing poor job with that) when you could have utilized the familiarity and gave us pulp space opera / action flicks like the stories described in these books?

[Bohandas]

Vestiges of it remain. Apple refuses to allow villains to have iPhones in movies, for example.

If they've actually filed suits about that that's way hard into IP-troll territory

[PontificatusRex]

But following these makes the decisions made with Solo movie that much more difficult to understand. Isn’t the very reason to use Solo that the audience is familiar with him, knows the character? Why on earth you choose to waste movie explaining his origins (and doing poor job with that) when you could have utilized the familiarity and gave us pulp space opera / action flicks like the stories described in these books?

Sadly, I don't think the creators of the Solo movie paid the slightest bit of attention to Brian Daley's work, more fool them.


Been lurking and catching up, but I will say again how amazing it is to revisit these stories and encounter a Han Solo who is so much more intelligent and competent than the guy in the movies.

[pendell]

Well, the people who made the movie may not have but the people
writing the books following off of the movie did -- while I was scanning I
noticed that Bollux shows up in one of the post-Solo books as a character.

To business.

Chapter 6
Whaddaya mean, voice-locked?

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So now here we are on Dellalt.



Dellalt is a mostly water planet. It was, of course, at one time central to the Empire of Xim The Despot. Afterwards, it was an important staging base during the Expansion period when the alliance of Corellia, Coruscant, and Kuat were exploring hyperdrive corridors, paving the way for what would eventually be the Republic. But that was all a long time ago. Trade has moved on, so today Dellalt is a backwater with only dim echoes of a glorious past, such as the empty vaults of Xim the Despot, which still hosts a local bank.

There is a local intelligent species -- Dellaltians .


They are described as "sauropteroids, large aquatic reptiles who live in a rigidly codified truce with the human inhabitants."

The place is dilapidated; while there are many ruins in disrepair, new construction is sparse and made of shabby materials. The local treatment plant, along with much other infrastructure, is in a state of disrepair and is inoperative.

There is no port bureaucracy but the landing of a new ship provokes a great deal of interest -- soon there is a large crowd of humans gawking and amusing themselves. It seems all of the city has turned out to see the Falcon.

Under these circumstances, they can't just walk to the bank vaults and get the box, because they'll be followed by a crowd, nay, a parade, and any attempt at stealth will be lost. Thus, Badure concocts a plan.

So it is that in short order the Falcon's main hatch opens, and Bollux begins carrying box after box of "cargo" into the nearest warehouse. Han and Badure , trailed by Skynx as observer, meet with the warehouse owner and begin bargaining over storage terms. Dellalt has a strong haggling culture. It is long, it is loud, it is performative. Both sides scream the most horrible imprecations at the other as negotiations for the price proceed. The commotion draws everyone in the spaceport.

And so, with all eyes fixed on Han, Hasti gets out of one of the boxes and leaves by the warehouse's back door. Bollux, prompted by Blue Max, re-secures the door behind her to quell any suspicions of the activities underway.

While Hasti is on her way, the argument out front gets more and more heated. Skynx, getting carried away, at last screams "Devourer of eggs!" at the warehouse owner.

After an awkward pause in which everyone has to think about what that means, Han at last orders Bollux to start loading the cargo back up until the owner is willing to be reasonable. The owner refuses to let him; they've already taken up his space and his time so until terms of some kind are agreed, they aren't getting their cargo back. Two of his attendants, now carrying rifles, take guard positions by the door. Han and Badure grumblingly return to the Falcon to plot their next move.

They aren't under any obligation to tell the owner that his goons are guarding empty boxes, are they?

Because they are. The Falcon was carrying no cargo, but did have a lot of boxes for the purpose; there was one that contained Hasti, but none of the others do.

Once aboard, there is a celebratory mood in the air. They open up their vacuum-distilled alcohol for a small celebration at how well things are going , and Badure encourages Skynx to break out his musical instrument and give them a tune. These were introduced last chapter but Han found an excuse to avoid it, as he has listened to his share of alien music which is, to a human ear, uneven in quality. There is stuff suitable for the gods on Olympus, yes, but there's also stuff that sounds like a garbage truck turning over. But Skynx is far along the "my gosh, that's wonderful" side of the spectrum, and Han is enchanted by the sound. Skynx is quite talented.

Bollux and Blue Max take their leave time to do some more study of the war-robot, which the two of them find fascinating.

Yeah, we can all see where this is going .

It's at this point Hasti returns, and informs them things have not gone as well as hoped. She had successfully made it to the vaults, bypassing the image on the front of Xim's Death's-head with the starburst and the motto: "IN ETERNAL HOMAGE TO XIM , WHOSE FIST SHALL ENCLOSE THE STARS AND WHOSE NAME WILL OUTLIVE TIME."

... y'know, at least the second of those is actually true. How many Pre-republic leaders do we remember, anyway? But his name, at least, stuck.

She met with the steward and was promptly foiled when the steward prompted her with an additional security measure -- a voice-coder. Which failed, of course, so here she is back, empty-handed. She finds this odd; Lanni hadn't mentioned anything about a voice-coder or being voice-printed.

...

which probably means she wasn't, I say. Which means there'd be no way into that vault even for the real Lanni if she were here; it's some sort of dodge , some trick, to keep people out of the vaults and away from their legitimate property. We'll see if that turns out to be true, but I wouldn't be surprised.

So what next?

Han heads to the cockpit, preparing to launch a good old-fashioned smash-n-grab; roll in with the Falcon, blast the doors open with the belly turret, grab what they can, get out. Hasti and Badure object and suggest maybe they should try something before getting the death mark on all of them.

Han considers this, then propose they all go out to a restaurant for a bite to eat. It'll help them think but, if no suitable alternative appears, Han is still prepared with the smash-and-grab solution.

They leave the Falcon and notice the guards have left the warehouse. Maybe they've figured out there's nothing worth guarding? Han has no time to develop the thought, however, when the spotlight hits them.

As their eyes adjust, they find a crowd of aliens and humans pointing guns at them, led by two ordinary humans, "thick , straight brown hair and widow's peaks, startling black-irised eyes, thin, intense pale faces."

It's J'uoch and R'all. Egome Fass, a huge hulk, is visible in the background behind them.

Their demands are abrupt and simple: Hand over the disk which you got from the vaults, or we start burning people down, starting with Han.

They won't believe us if we tell them the truth, of course. And who's to say they won't kill us when they have what they want anyway?

Chewbacca prepares to die "as the head of a Wookie Honor Family, his life so intimately intertwined with Han Solo's there existed no human word for the relationship."

Backstory-riffic! Chewbacca is the head of a family? Does that mean the relationship with Han, or something else? If with Han, I wonder if he knows that he is , in Wookie terms, Chewie's b--ch?

Blue Max and Bollux exchange high speed burst communication, then Bollux steps forward. "Captain Solo must not come to harm. I will open the Millenium Falcon for you."

J'uoch allows it, and Bollux does -- then almost immediately two of her guards are bowled over flat by something so fast they can't even see, responding to more burst messages from Blue Max.

We will find out, in the next chapter, that this is the Falcon's targeting remote, used first by Han for blaster practice and later by Luke for lightsaber practice. It seems that it can move veryfast on its repulsors, and Blue Max is using it as an improvised weapon to smash into J'uoch's thugs!

"Run for it!" Blue Max screams, and all pandemonium breaks loose.

And on that note, I guess we're set up for another encounter in the next chapter. Initiative to team Solo and I suppose this will be a surprise round as well, but they are massively outnumbered. Still, as Han says, "never tell me the odds."

Dellalt also shows up in the Legends continuity, by the way.
In X-wing The Corvette Bixby defected from an Imperial Convoy in this very system. Certainly a backwater like Dellalt seems the ideal place to strike at passing Imperial trade. The Imperials can't defend everywhere , after all, and this is a place hardly worth defending.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[pendell]

Moving on to Chapter 7.


Roll for initiative!

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When we last read, the Falcon is being confronted by the mining camp villains, and Blue Max had just kicked off a combat encounter by ramming the Falcon's remote combat drone, normally used for target practice, into two of the gun-toting thugs at the base of the ramp. Now it's time to run for it!

I should also note something I missed in the previous chapter: The weapons of our party were confiscated when J'uoch and R'all showed up to ambush the party in the last chapter.

ROUND 1:
Han and Badure both jump the nearest guard with the intent of taking their weapons and running for it. Han succeeds, and takes the guard's weapon: a projecticle carbine with a drum magazine. Badure has more trouble, and is grappling with the younger, fitter man.

Egome Fass, the enforcer , comes up behind Chewie and sucker-punches him. The two giants start their own personal combat.

Round 2: Chewie is now down but still conscious. Badure is tackled by Hasti because one of the other goons is about to shoot at him. When he is tackled, his opponent is hit by the blast intended for Badure, killing him.

J'uoch is blasting away at the remote with Hasti's confiscated pistol but missing -- several weeks of sparring with Han has made Blue Max good at dodging blasts.

Han fires a burst into Egome Fass' chest, but it does no good -- the enforcer is wearing body armour. Even so, Fass ducks for cover, and this gives Chewie a chance to struggle to his feet.

As an aside, maybe THIS is what stormtrooper armour is for: It won't protect against a direct hit by a military-grade blaster, but it'll do just fine against fragments , projectiles, and reflect glancing hits. An army immune to artillery HE is an army with a really significant tactical advantage compared to modern ones -- and this appears to be common in the Star Wars universe in this epoch. In Episode 1 the Grand Army of the Gungans was immune to Trade Federation artillery -- and the battle was decided when the shield generators protecting them were taken down by infantry in direct assault.

Perhaps there are more kinds of weapons in the Star Wars universe than blasters, which we don't often see because most of the battles against stormtroopers we see are fought against Alderaanian Royal Guard, first-line Rebel troops, and prisoners armed with captured Imperial military weapons. Battles, I point out, the stormtroopers win every time except when they are deliberately trying to allow the Death Star captives to escape, when their vaunted accuracy from the beginning of the movie makes a sudden and inexplicable drop.

Back to the fight.

Hasti and Badure have made a break for it. Han is providing suppressing fire and covering their retreat as Chewbacca, still groggy from being beaten by Egome Foss, is running. Bollux is also running. When a goon tries to stop him, Blue Max hits the villain with a drone. Then, since the drone does not operate at any distance from the Falcon, he sends it back aboard. Han, meanwhile, has run out of ammunition. Skynx has also made it away, carrying his musical instruments with him.

Now all our characters have broken contact , but the villains still surround the Falcon, and its hatch is open. But there is no choice; we don't have the firepower or numbers to take it back. Time to make a strategic withdrawal and hide into town while J'uoch posts a guard on the ship and calls for reinforcement.

Soon, it arrives -- a gigantic cargo lighter customized with heavy weapons. It carries a large crew, and begins to set down at various points in the city to drop off search parties, which begin combing the town looking for our party.

A question in my mind: Backwater or not, this IS a major city and a major planet in the Tion Hegemony. Where's the local police? Where's the local navy? Are they really going to do nothing but cower while a pirate ship, a cargo lighter, hovers over their city as if it were a Star Destroyer?

It appears that's exactly what they're going to do. It gives the feel of one of those hapless villages from a western or samurai flick who need to hire a band of heroes to protect them.

Han asks Skynx why he didn't grab a gun, who rejoins sharply, asking how he would have wrestled a weapon away from someone four times his size.

Skynx makes himself useful by shimmying up a pole -- he has a significant positive modifier for climb checks. He sees search parties moving through the cities, carrying handheld lights and presumably commlinks.

Interesting that there are no NVG or thermal vision present, but that seems to be the case in the Star Wars Outer Rim -- it's akin to the modern third world, where you can't assume you'll find a walmart with tactical gear and weapons on every corner. There's a hodgepodge of technology available, where pre-twentieth century technology is transported in interstellar starships. This ain't the Core; so people make do.

One of the parties is going to find them; it is a party of three which has travelled nearby on a ship's boat from the lighter and is heading their way. One of whom is carrying both Han's blaster and Chewbacca's bowcaster. How convenient. Something terrible is going to happen to this party, I think. We can't avoid contact with them in any case.

Roll for initiative! Again!

The person leading the search party has seen too many holos; when he spots Chewie he brings around Chewbacca's own bowcaster to shoot him down, blocking his own comrades' fire as he does so. But Chewbacca knows this weapon better than he knows his right hand, and knows how difficult it is for a first time shooter. He dodges at just the right time and the quarrel misses. He tries to reload the bowcaster but find his arms aren't wookie-long or wookie-strong; wookies don't design their bowcasters with human use in mind. At least, not this one. Bowcasters are used by humans in other media, but the goon is flat not strong enough to work the bolt on this one. He doesn't have time to draw Han's pistol before Chewbacca is on him, and that's the end of his story.

Thankfully, this guy's actions meant he inadvertently protected the rest of the charging party from blaster fire by blocking his own side's fire when he tried to play hero; the rest of the team is now entirely within melee range. Well, as they say ...


Han settles one with the butt end of his carbine while Hasti and Badure subdue the other.

Now time for interrogation of the two conscious guards. "You'll live", he tells them, "if you make some worthwhile conversation."

The guards are more than happy to tell all they know -- 12 guards on the Falcon, and exactly where their boat is.

"Sonny, you just bought yourself a future", Badure says. He finds a stunner weapon carried by one of the goons, and stuns them both. "I've grown to dislike unnecessary killing", he says.

They find the boat, but as soon as they try to start it the communications comes on and J'uoch demands to know what they're doing. By the time they get it up and running, the enemy lighter is on its way.

There's no way to escape in the boat from that lighter, so Han sets it on auto and sends it flying off into the night. If they can't escape with it, they can at least use it to fake their deaths.

It is not long in coming. The lighter fires on the boat and destroys it. Presumably J'uoch and R'all believe our team is now dead.

But then .. .well, I guess we should have expected this.

The lighter turns, travels over to the Falcon, and mates with it via the top collar. The lighter sails away into the night, carrying the Falcon with it!

Of course. Badure notes that they must believe our party managed to get the flight recorder from the vault, and now they're taking the Falcon back to their camp in order to strip her down to her bolts searching for the prize.

Even though we're now on foot, Han prepares to set out in pursuit. He says only one thing: "I want my ship back."

So, goodbye Millenium Falcon, you were a glorious ship. Chasing down interstellar pirates on foot seems like a low-probability prospect, but needs must. And, as Han would say, "never tell me the odds".

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Bohandas]

You're assuming a lot of competence on the part of the people who make droids, if anything can be observed from Star Wars it's that droids are fairly routinely annoying, unfit for purpose and exhibit tendencies that contradict their intended function, unless they're one of the extremely expensive ones. Programming in Star Wars isn't good, especially when it comes to droids, and manufacturing flaws are common in the cheap ones.

B1s the exemplars of this trend, but protocol droids, astromechs, pit droids, tactical droids (republic/imperial and CIS,) servant droids and so forth have all shown a lot of individuals who are to be blunt, really bad at their nominal job due to huge personality flaws that aren't intended parts of their programming.

For example, CIS Tactical Droids are arrogant, overlook details and actively consider droids to be superior to organics. None of these are details the CIS would want in their droids, but they're in there anyway because they're bad at making droids despite being the best people in the Galaxy at making droids, and the tactical droid not being all that cheap.

Or C-3PO, just everything about him. He's a coward, talks over people, is rude and prissy, and generally not good at being a translator despite perfectly capable of the actual job of translating, because he's incredibly undiplomatic most of the time.

Also WAC-47, R2-DT, Chopper, Todo 360, EV-A4-D, and presumably a double digit number of droid characters from the EU. All of them have personalities that go beyond, and sometimes conflict with, their intended function.

Yeah, a lot of them would fit right in with the robots from Futurama or Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Or C-3PO, just everything about him. He's a coward, talks over people, is rude and prissy, and generally not good at being a translator despite perfectly capable of the actual job of translating, because he's incredibly undiplomatic most of the time.

Wasn't C-3P0 also designed a programmer, or at least a debugger? IIRC the reason the skywalkers buy him is because some of the languages he understands are coding languages

[pendell]

So C-3PO is a chatbot? That explains a lot.


Chapter 8
Han refuses to read the small print

Spoiler

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The scene opens upon a rainy day, behind a warehouse where a tarp has been stretched. Our heroes
huddle underneath it to keep out of the rain. All are wearing cloaks courtesy of Badure, who pilfered one from a drunk rolled out on the street and , wearing that disguise, bought three more for each of his companions. Decent of him. I wonder if he could have gone one step further
and bought four cloaks, then return the original one?

There isn't a cloak suitable for Skynx, so the team produces a travelling bag. Skynx is infuriated at the idea, but calms when Solo gives him the flask of vacuum-distilled booze as a
traveling companion. Soon Skynx is happily snoring away in the bag, "tight as a scalp tick."

Plans. J'uoch must have been tipped to their presence by informants in town, so it would be a bad idea to stay. Therefore they must go. But where? Han will hear of only one place: To the mining camp to get his ship back. When Hasti says the ship will undoubtedly be torn apart by the time we get there, Han retorts angrily: "THEN I'LL PUT HER BACK TOGETHER!"

So, we're going to the mining camp. How to get there? They either can't or won't use local transportation, so the intent is to cross the lake by local ferry, then look around on the other side where there are more options.

They arrive at the ferry stop where tow-rafts are being loaded to be drawn across by the swimming people. They find a gang of toughs , acting in a dual role as porters and security, guarding the wharf. The leader of the gang tells them they must speak to Kasarax, the Top Bull, to negotiate passage. He hails over to a large swimmer, who is extremely large and possessing fangs longer than a human forearm. They discuss. Kasarax's price is 40 driit per person, for a total of 160 driit for the four (not counting Skynx, concealed in the bag). We don't have an exchange rate, but this is apparently an astronomical sum. Han tries to dicker, and considers approaching the other Swimmers, but no one will gainsay Kasarax, whose price is fixed at 40 driit per person.

Then they notice an older bull, as big as kasarax, battle scars all over and missing the left eye. The shore leader tells them not to bother if they know what's good for them, but Han and party go over anyway.

The older Swimmer, by the name of Shazeen, tells them that once upon a time he would have towed them across for eight driit apiece -- but today is free. He seeks an occasion against Kasarax, to prove that the lake belongs to all Swimmers and not just to Kasarax' clique. But he has been unable to until now, mostly because the shore gang keeps away any would-be passengers for Kazeen with raw violence -- it's Kasarax, walk around the lake, or get clobbered.

Kazeen explains the rules and intricate code that governs the lake.

-- Humans may not use weapons on each other, but pretty much anything else goes. We'll have to fight our way past the shore party, in unarmed combat for submission damage only, to earn the right to be towed by Kazeen.

-- The Swimmers will not interfere with the humans, so leave them alone. Above all, don't kill one or it'll become a death-matter and the killer will never leave the planet alive.

Han accepts the terms and we head down to the dock. The shore gang wants to fight; Han and company are willing to give them one.

Then Chewbacca enters the fray.

I don't really need to say any more, do I? "Then Chewbacca entered the fray." He's still upset about losing to Egome Fass and is determined to show he's still capable of fighting unarmed. The main highlight of the fight is when the gang leader goes from him and the hood of Chewie's disguising cloak falls away. He gives a full-throated RAWWWR in the face of the leader, who stops in his tracks, white as a sheet. With one finger, Chewbacca gently pushes him, and he promptly sits down , gentle as a lamb.

Now fast forward to the bit where he's surrounded by the semi- or un-conscious bodies of his comrades, moaning in pain.

The party boards the tow-raft. Next to them, Kasarax is bullying the slowly-recovering gang aboard a second raft as his own "passengers" for a trip across the lake of his own. We catch some of his silver, persuasive tongue:

"
You'll do as I say! There's nowhere you can hide from me, even in that shelter you built under your house. If you make me, I'll dig you out like a stoneshell from the lake bottom. And the whole time, You'll hear me coming!"


Passengers are quickly found.

"Mighty persuasive lad, that nephew of mine", comments Shazeen.

Yes. Shazeen used to be Top Bull, but retired to go where the fish are fat and the living is easy. But then he heard about Kasarax's extortion and monopoly racket, so came back to see what he could do about it.

As we pull away from the dock, we found out more of what's going on: Kasarax is going to cross as they do, then provoke a "right of way dispute" with Shazeen, in the course of which he will thump the living daylights out of Shazeen, then overturn his raft.

Or so he thinks.

Shazeen has his own plans, of course. The main thing our party has to worry about are Kasarax thugs, acting as passengers of Kasarax, who may try to join the fight. Don't let them throw you into the water and send them swimming, but don't kill anyone, and especially don't kill any swimmers.

Han is quite reluctant but it is of course far too late to do anything about it.

And so the two Swimmers depart from the docks , yelling at each other to stay clear of each other's course, all the while Han wonders: "Why do I always think of these things too late?"

We--ell someone's going swimming in the next chapter. Seems like Brian Daley really went out of his way to set up this little side vignette. I wonder why it was so important?

Anyways, on to the next time. Bring swimming gear.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[tomandtish]

Back from vacation and playing catch up.

Wasn't C-3P0 also designed a programmer, or at least a debugger? IIRC the reason the skywalkers buy him is because some of the languages he understands are coding languages

OWEN: What I really need is a droid that understands the binary language of moisture vaporators.

THREEPIO: Vaporators! Sir -- My first job was programming binary load lifter... very similar to your vaporators. You could say...

So it sounds like he has some programming ability.

[pendell]

Chapter 9
Splashdown waterpark

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When we left our heroes they were being towed behind a Swimmer who was getting into a fight with the younger ,fitter Kasarax towing his own barge full of goons.

The water, it seems, is filled with other Swimmers, some on our side (Shazeen's), some on Kasarax's, some not on any. But it's a tense moment.

Also, I didn't note this in the last chapter because I thought it was trivia but I was wrong -- Brian Daley almost never puts in detail for the sake of detail; it's usually a Chekhov's gun for later in the story and this is no exception: On the dockside Hasti shelled out for a pastry treat, which is very doughy, like edible chocolate cookie dough (yummm... ). Not baked but very gooey and very sticky.

As the Swimmers jostle each other , Skynx's bag slides aft and Chewbacca scoops it up to save him. Skynx bleerily pokes his face out of the bag, looks around, says " I bet five credits on us!" Looks over at the other raft: "And five more on them!" Then sinks blearily back into the sack to sleep the sleep of the just. Or at least the very drunk.

As the villain barge comes along side, their crew chief, who has recovered from his beating at Chewbacca's hands remarkably quickly, takes out an axe to sever our barge's towing hawsers, stranding the towing-raft in the middle of the lake. Mindful of the warning against bloodshed, Han whips out his blaster and shoots the axe itself, blowing a hole in it. The chief drops it but it is quickly scooped up by another member of the crew. This is an axe, not a blaster; it's still functional despite having a hole blown in it. One of the hawsers is cut.

Shazeen , our battle-scarred veteran swimmer who is blind in one eye and fairly old, swerves hard. The axe, the crew chief, and Han's blaster go flying. The crew chief falls off the raft but saves himself and grabs onto Han's barge , where he begins sawing away at the remaining hawser with a knife.

Han can't have that, discarding his flight jacket, he comes down to fight the boss unarmed hand-to-hand. A few seconds of grappling and a swerve by Shazeen later, both of them are in the drink. Shazeen swerves back and the raft bonks the chief's head.

At this point, Shazeen can't help any more as both he and Kasarax duck out of their harnesses to throw down mano-a-mano. The crew chief has no interest in being caught between the two fighting Swimmers and swims for shore as quickly as he can. Han is pulled back aboard his own barge by his friends. Bollux hands over Han's blaster, which the robot had retrieved before it could fall into the drink. "I'm doubling your salary", Han comments. So generous, twice nothing is still nothing.

One of the other Swimmers , a very young bull, swims out to our raft and begins shaking it with his mouth, trying to capsize it. Han is preparing to blast him but Hasti warns him off -- they'll ALL, come after them, on both sides, if they kill a Swimmer. So Han improvises -- grabbing Hasti's doughy treat, he smacks it right smack down on the Swimmer's blowhole, into which it disappears with a schloop. Temporarily unable to breathe, the swimmer backs off to regain composure. Before he's done one of Shazeens allies swims over to fight him and take the pressure off our team.

Fighting is now general. As Groo the Wander sould say: FRAY!

In the center of the battle are Kasarax and Shazeen. Shazeen pretends to be worn down by the fighting -- not hard to do considering he's considerably older than Kasarax. He does the ooh me leg et cetera routine, except with flippers rather than legs. Kasarax dives under , then swims around to Shazeen's blind side ...

.. and gets a faceful of pain for his trouble as Shazeen suddenly slams his bony foreskull right into where Kasarax is just coming up. This isn't Shazeen's first rodeo, and as he later comments to Han, "These youngsters always think they're clever, coming up on my blind side."

Now Shazeen has his tusks on Kasarax's neck, but refrains from the death bite. Kasarax takes his cue and keens his surrender. Shazeen backs off and delivers to Kasarax an old-fashioned Marine-style DI chewing out. Han and the party can't understand a word, but the tone is unmistakable and Kasarax is suitable chastened.

Shazeen ducks back into his harness. "Now, where were we?"

Han thanks Shazeen for bonking the chief on the head. Shazeen said "An accident, peewee. Didn't I tell you it was unlawful to meddle in a human squabble? "

"Accident." Har har. I guess I'm glad the bad guys aren't the only ones who can bend the law into a pretzel when occasion serves.

Shazeen tells us Kasarax, his nephew, will be Shazeen's deputy and will be groomed to take over as head of the lake in due time; Shazeen's fighting days are almost over. "Kasarax will be all right. He thought he wanted us to fear him. He'll like it better once we respect him; all but the worst ones come around given the chance".

They continue to the shore. Shazeen comments to Hasti that this is her second trip across, and does she like it better? Hasti is puzzled for a minute before putting it together; Of course. She's still wearing Lanni's clothes from two chapters ago when she went to the bank vault. So the previous passenger was not her, but Lanni, her sister!

Do tell. So what did "I" do on this last trip?

"Came across and asked people questions about those mountains there, waved a machine in the air, and went back."

So what's in those mountains, pray?

"Nothing." Shazeen replies. "Few humans go there, even fewer come back. It's desolation."

Perhaps that's where the mining camp is? Anyway, looks like we have our next plot hook!

So we've had our little placed encounter and are moving on towards our next destination. If this were an RPG campaign I'd say it felt like the party was on rails at this point. I wonder why Daley felt it was so important to write this particular scene in, as while it is kind of fun it also seems out of character for a star pilot. But then, I suppose he had to take away the Falcon in the last few chapters in order to prevent Han from just solving the problem with his ship in one paragraph, or giving us another chase scene as concluded the last book.

I rather liked Shazeen, the Swimmer. He's charming, roguish , and has some definite personality. He definitely gives the flavor of an old, semi-retired worker trying to put the young bucks in their place, like Hub Mcann in Second Hand Lions .

So I suppose our next fixed encounter with my next chapter. Looking forward to it!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[runeghost]

It's interesting to see these stories again with decades of roleplaying under my belt. As pendell points out, something like this last chapter really feels like a planned encounter in a late-80s, early-90s RPG. (Kind of similarly, to cross threads for a bit, the A-plot in the last ep of The Mandalorian had a hefty dose of "why the PCs need to be the ones to do this".)

As pendell has summarized all these for us, I've had the thought that most of them could probably be written up as adventures. The amount of rails you'd need could vary - Han Solo's Revenge, for example, didn't so much have rails as a DM/author determined to feed the characters the info they needed no matter where they went. (I normally consider rails as "you're having this encounter, which leads to that clue", while other scripted adventures can have more of a pyramid or grid structure - the PCs will find clues to the end regardless, but how they find them does have an effect on their experiences (and rewards).

Han & Chewie have a starship, and its been interesting to see the various ways Daley has maneuvered to keep the story moving with the Falcon in (or temporarily out) of the picture.

[pendell]

Chapter 10
Overland march

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Since the last chapter, Shazeen has pink-slipped Kasarax' shore crew as they believe they're the
ones who misled Kasarax into trying his mafia extortation racket. True or not, they have vacated
and left behind a great deal of abandoned material, which Han and team sort through to prepare for their trip.

Amongst other things they find food for a 12 day journey, clothes suitable for hiking, cold-weather gear, lengths of rope, and canteens for water. They are dependent on finding more water in the mountains, but given the multiplicity of streams this is unlikely to present a problem.

They can't find any transport, animal-powered or mechanical, but Han is not bothered by this. He neither has the interest to learn to deal with a new life form nor the desire to trust to ancient machinery on the verge of breaking down.

What they did not find was sophisticated climbing gear, medipacks , weapons, or extra charges. Even so, they are armed. Han and Chewbacca have been able to hold onto their own weapons, and from their encounter with J'uoch's group they have acquired a stunner and two power pistols for Badure as well as a compact disruptor, a toxic dart thrower, and a nearly-out-of-charge blaster for Hasti. That last is being used by Han to recharge his own. Skynx declines to bear weapons, and Bollux is a First Law robot who also will not carry them. They are also devoid of optics save for the scope on Han's pistol. Thus equipped, they are on their way.

Marching order:
Chewbacca on point
Bollux
Badure+Hasti side by side
Skynx
Han as rear guard

Skynx breaks out his musical instruments and plays them a marching tune as they go along, which makes everything a little easier to bear.

To pass the time, Badure and Hasti discuss Han. Badure notes he wasn't always a freighter bum -- the red piping on his trousers is the Corellian Bloodstripe . About once a decade, the Corellian Defense Forces gives that award out to one of the millions of service people serving either the CDF or an allied force, such as the Imperial Navy. Usually posthumously. Hasti asks Badure how Han got his nickname. It's easily told; Badure had been a navy officer but was remanded to a training command after being caught running a gambling ring on ship. While he was there, the training commandant came up with this bright idea of deliberately rigging a training vessel -- A U-33 orbital loadlifter -- for failures in what was called "realistic stress simulations."

This wasn't all that uncommon in the 1960s. I read a memoir of a helicopter pilot in Vietnam and that was part of his training -- every once in awhile the instructor would simply cut the power to the rotors, forcing the student to perform an autorotation immediately. The end result was that the student gained an appreciation for the vehicle and would be constantly looking out, even on routine flights, for likely autorotation spots just in case the power happened to go out.

Badure isn't a fan of this kind of training, but the commandant doesn't care. So they brief and prepare to take the craft up with a load of students. One of the students is a smart-aleck who corrects the commandant on some trifling mechanical detail, and finds himself volunteered to be the first trainee to be "educated" on this crate.

It's our buddy Solo, of course.

So they take it up into the air and it doesn't take long before this old piece of scrap gives out for real. They need to get back down and Badure, as instructor, is flying. He brings it back down but can't get the landing gear extended. He calls for emergency tractor retrieval from ground control but it's no go -- both primary AND secondary tractors have red lights.

Badure just barely manages to get the craft back into the air from the failed approach, and of course the Commandant is soiling himself with fear. Solo, who apparently knows the U-33 very well, tells them this is a common occurrence on this kind of craft; the reservoir locking valve on the landing gear is stuck shut. They can joggle it lose with a couple of maneuvers.

The Commandant balks at acrobatics with an old school bus, but Badure tells him that either he lands the crate or let the kid try his idea. The commandant agrees; all their lives are in Solo's hands.

First, Solo calls the passenger compartment over the intercom and tell them they are undergoing an emergency drill; their performance will be graded. Badure protests at this falsehood but Solo tells him the last thing they need at this critical juncture is a panic. Badure lets it go.

Now Solo starts taking the craft into a series of violent loops, each one cranking out the landing gear just a little further. Finally, when it is extended he has to remain upside down until the gear is fully locked into place. At which points he inverts right-side-up and brings it down. The landing is .. well, it's like the second one in this short . They go through two stop nets but, they land into the wind and thankfully stop. The craft isn't flyable but that's okay because no one will ever take this thing up again for any money.

Han locks down his board just as it says in the manual, and asks Badure, "Slick enough for you?"

"Slick", Badure replies, and "Slick" has been the nickname ever since.

Hasti asks Badure if , knowing what he did now, he'd still tell the other cadets the truth. Indeed he would.

Okay, so what do you make of OUR chances now?

Badure hesitates, but before he can speak Han comes over and gives his own opinion. They have a chance to pull this off without casualties, but there's a good chance that there will be friendlies killed on this run.

Hasti scoffs. J'uoch has tons of hired killers.

Han scoffs right back. They're two-bit thugs and part-timers. The only REAL gunman in a parsec is standing right in front of her.

It is at this exact moment that a second ship touches down in Dellalt's main spaceport and disgorges it's sole occupant.

It's Gallandro.

So we had a long walk with some intriguing backstory to make us forget nothing actually happened in this chapter. Still a great bit of lore that was included here, and now we've got an old enemy coming to settle the score from last book. Things are getting interesting!

See you next time!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[pendell]

On to Chapter 11.

An ancient ruin. Indigenous people of Dellalt..

Spoiler

Show

We travel almost all the way through the mountains. Bollux has been working as an impromptu ESM seeking for signals or electronic signatures. He eventually detects a weak version, which leads the team to the edge of a vast landing field covered in mid-sized starships.

This sight heightens the team's spirits. Supplies? Food? People? Transportation? We're short on all of those things and the romance of a walk in the mountains has long since worn off. There is a question why this isn't on any map, but this point is quickly dismissed ; Dellalt has been a backwater for a long time and is by no means thoroughly surveyed. Even a dedicated search team might have missed this field, hidden as it is. Han approaches as point, taking the most risk on himself, and notices something odd: The craft are tied down with their tails to the wind. This is the diametric opposite of standard practice, which ties down noses into the wind to minimize their exposure and potential damage from winds.

This oddity is resolved as Han gets closer and swears most colorfully; they're mockups. A decoy airfield. Still, it is odd; these decoys are well-maintained. It would make sense if they were ancient wrecks from some war centuries ago, but these are relatively new. Someone is maintaining them, but why? There aren't any interstellar wars or militaries in the Dellalt system, so far as Han knows.

Actually, what Han doesn't know but we do from the X-wing game is that the Rebel alliance is active in the Dellalt system, and therefore the most likely creators of a decoy installation. But -- minor spoiler -- it's not them this time.

They continue to poke around until Skynx falls down. Han goes to investigate, and is quickly incapacitated himself. He has just time to yell but it is not enough -- all the party is paralyzed except Bollux.

Figures emerge to take them captive, and vents are closed -- paralysis gas. These figures are as odd as the decoy ships. While they wear garments that look like space suits, most of the tubing is disconnected, the details painted on. Still, the helmets are effective as gas masks, which presumably is why these people aren't affected by the gas. Their weapons are workable enough, however, and the voices which echo from the helmets show their captors are human.

They are carried into an underground installation. The sound of children chanting lessons; the voices of adults, heavy machinery, the smells of food; this is an underground settlement, not a military base only.

Bollux is taken away, and the rest of the team are dumped into a large, open room the size of a mid-size starship hangar with little detail except a glow-rod giving light by the door. Once the team recovers from the gas, Han suggests now is the best time to escape, but it is solid stone ; even Chewbacca cannot force it. Han checks himself to find his captors are efficient; they are stripped of everything except their clothes, not left so much as a toothpick. There are row after row of long stone monoliths, but nothing else whatever in the room.

Another oddity is that it is very dry in here; you would expect moisture, at least from condensation.

With nothing else to do, Han and Chewbacca start a mental game of Dejarik. Dejarik, like chess, can be played purely by reciting moves to each other in a standard notation , with both partners visualizing the board in their heads.

Hasti is throwing a tremendous temper tantrum, and Han goes to speak to her.

Skynx still has his musical instrument and begins to play his home colony's song -- "By the banks of the Warm, Pink Z'gag". It is a song of mating time when the chroma-wings come to bring their seed and continue the next generation. Skynx notes that he wanted adventure, but it has been little but hardship and danger. If he can get back to the river Z'gag, he'll never leave again!

The music has an ... effect ... on Han and Hasti. They start to drift towards each other, then an embrace .. a kiss... and then Hasti pulls away. She explains why.

"You run all over people and you never take anything seriously, for starters. You joke through life with that silly smirk on your face, so sure of yourself I want to bounce a rock off your skull!"

"Solo, my sister Lanni inherited Dad's guild book, so she had pilot's status here in the Tion. But I had to work any job I could get. Mess-hand, housegirl, sanitation crew. I've done them all in the camps, the mines, the factories. I've seen your type all my life. Everything's a big laugh, and you can charm the daylights out of people when you feel like it, but you're gone the next day and you never look back. There are no people in your life, Han!"

Well, she's got him there. We've had two love interests in as many books and they all disappeared quite quickly from Han's life; he doesn't seem to be big on staying power in most relationships.

Han, a bit hurt by his rejection, noticing Skynx commenting that he wished he could see his home colony and smell the pheromones one more time. What would Solo wish for?

Solo responds: "Stronger pheromones".

It's at this point the door opens and Bollux is brought in. They congregate around him to hear what he has to say, but the most important fact is that Bollux has found what their hosts intend to do with them: Namely, they are to be a human sacrifice.

Didn't we already see this in Return of the Jedi? Although , come to think of it, this book came out some three years before that movie. Maybe ROTJ borrowed from them instead?

It's kinda disappointing that almost all the locals we meet turn out to be savages or cannibals or what not. Very 19th century viewpoint.

Still, next time we'll see how Han and company are able to get out of their latest jam. As opposed to BECOMING jam. Next time!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[tomandtish]

it's a pretty accurate description of Han at this point in his life. The only significant relationship he has is Chewy, in that "we're men so we won't talk about it" way.